Google prospers as ad sales soar

Google reported a record $1.3bn in revenues for its fiscal quarter ending 31 March, up 93 per cent on last year. Net income rose by 448 per cent to $369m.

The search company saw a sharp increase in revenue from advertisements on the pages displaying search results. Revenues from the Google sites increased by 116 per cent, making up 52 per cent of the company's total proceeds.

Partners that signed up for Google's AdSense programme contributed to 47 per cent of the total revenues, showing a 75 per cent year-over-year increase.

The programme allows website operators ranging from bloggers to professional publishers to run Google Ads on their website and get paid per click-through.

When these commissions to partner websites are subtracted, Google made $794m in revenues.

Google followed Yahoo's lead in beating analyst expectations. Yahoo earlier this week posted $1.17bn in revenue and $204.6m income. Correcting for commissions to partner websites, Yahoo's revenues were $820.8m.